Codename: Red Iris
by Paulydasy
Summary: Accidental Jedi Nobi Khun leads a crack assault team of Republic Commandos to rid the galaxy of the gangster Hutts, and rescue the slaves. Instead what he found was a beautiful red eyed woman, locked in a steel cloning cylinder, who will change his life.
1. Chapter 1

The wind was cold and chilling to the bone.

_The force. The force is a joke._

The LAAT/I screamed over treetops at 600 kilometers. In the open cargo bay, the winds assaulted Nobi Khun's unprotected body. The coldness, the numbness seeping in.

_May the force be with you, the greatest lie of all. _

"Commander." There was no response. "Commander!" yelled Sergeant Howe.

Nobi Khun looked up at the towering white figure. His whole body is covered by an assortment of white armored plates. Over that, a black tactical vest, held various ammo clips and grenades. Nobi was looking at a Republic commando. A clone bred in the icy vats of Kamino, trained from birth to fight the last war, Sergeant Howe did really seem to radiate that kind of aura.

"Sitrep commander! The V-19 Torrents expected heavier than expected air defenses around the city. Command is diverting all of them for air defense suppression. They'll probably be needed there if we're going to clear our ingress route. And that's the good news. The bad news is we're just lost our air cover. Close air support will not be available except for our gunships. I recommend we abort, but it's your call sir! " The last sentence came out as an accusation more than a question.

Nobi looked around the cargo bay. There was Doc, sitting calmly in the corner with his boot dangling out the gunship, as if on a pleasure cruise. Doc looked like the other commandos, except with a medical rucksack on his back. Doc, as everybody taken to calling him was a clone combat medic. Trained to save lives in an organization that lives to do the opposite, how's that for a contradiction?

Then there was her. She was busy stuffing some ammo in her pouches. In her hands held the largest sniper rifle Nobi has ever seen. Her name was Kayla. A republic intelligence agent by training, her marksmanship skilled later pushed her into Group Echo: the Republic's secret assassination team. Totally deniable, they killed without trace. Anyone, anywhere was their motto.

Then there was Sat. Sat was a combat controller. On his back are radios that enable him to communicate with anyone on and off the planet. Calling in artillery and coordinating air strikes was his specialty. His head is always dropped down, concentrating on some coms traffic or another.

"Sir what are your orders?"

Nobi took a deep breath, just then the gunship was rocked by a loud explosion. Before he could exhale, a wounded clone fell on top of him. His shriek drowned out by the slipstream in the open troop bay.

"Medic! Corpsman!" screamed Nobi, not knowing what the GAR called its own medical personnel. But Doc is already on the case.

"Clean hit through the shoulder, not life threatening. You'll live _ner vod. _ So stop screaming already." Doc said is such a dead pan voice, that the entire cabin looked over.

"84 is our slicer. We can't get through the securities without him. We gotta abort!" observed Sergeant Howe.

"No! We do not abort!" screamed Nobi. He reached for the intercom on the bulkhead. Task Force 69, this is Jedi Paddawan Nobi, mission is go, I repeat the mission is a go. Acknowledge. "

"Lucy copies." Lucy is the V-19 torrent flight leader conducting suppression of enemy air defenses around the city.

"Barber roger." Barber is the mission commander on the RAS Majestic orbiting the planet.

"Bishop wilco." Bishop is the lead LAAT/I.

The mission element leaders chimed in over the command circuit.

"All elements green light."

Howe fairly glared at him. "Respectfully sir, I know I'm just a line grunt, and you're a divine Jedi officer. But you've only been at this for 3 days, while I've conducting airborne assaults before I could talk. We need our hacker, and 84 is non mission capable. Look at him, he can barely walk." Sergeant Howe reminded himself, that he is talking to an officer, and took a deep breath. "This assault is based in speed and surprise. They out number us 20 to one. In order to do so, we need to disable and jam their security system. It's black art. None of us knows how to do it, 'cept 84 down here. I won't be leading my men, my brothers, in a suicidal frontal assault….sir."

"I can be your slicer. I've been doing it before I could read," said Nobi.

Howe looked over at this pip squeak of an officer. One more try to abort this whole mess.

"Alright, sir, I see that you don't have your lightsaber with you. How 'bout this?" Howe tossed him a Verpine SA-15. A compact assault rifle. It can shoot 300 spiked slugs per second. And the best thing about it, it made absolutely no sound. The whole assault team is equipped with some version of it. Blaster rifles were lighter and more accurate. But the Verp has more penetration, in addition to its silence.

The whole cabin full of elite assaulters now looked at Nobi, the pip squeak officer. What does he know about Verpine rifles eh? Maybe this will shut him up. To the surprise of everybody, Nobi expertly loaded a magazine, chambered a round, and switch the fire selector position to single shot.

"You got any assault scopes and tac lights?" One of the assaulters handed him one from the arms box.

Sergeant Howe was slightly annoyed, but impressed.

The two gunships are now are skimming the rooftops towards the Hutt palace on Tatooine. The roof sentries never saw them coming, for their attention is focused on the V-19 Torrents doing their deadly craft to the east. The LAAT/I popped up at the last minute and dived down on to the roof.

"30 seconds!" screamed Howe. The assaulters replied with an animal like grunt.

After being with these guys for a day, it surely have rubbed on the novice Jedi. Nobi couldn't help but let out a battle cry of his own.

Nobi felt the gunship decelerate, his heart was in his throat.

The gunships kicked up a millennia of dust on the roof so much that the pilot couldn't see anything, but his radar altimeter.

"Go go go!" First in, last out, the noncoms' creed, Howe chuckled, and kicked out his fast rope and fairly jumped after it.

It was the shortest fast rope in the entire _di kut _ universe. They were only a foot off the roof.

The assault team split up in to 7 four man teams.

The first team started rappelling down the ledge, upside down. It's called the Nar assault. The fastest assault rappel known. Side arms drawn, they started down.

A small explosion startled Nobi out of his reverie. The breacher has begun his work on the roof access door. Howe and company roared right through. They rushed down stairs as quick as they can.

No opposition yet hmm.

Red team began to systematically clear the 10th floor. In the films at Coroscant theaters, commandos would be seen to barge in and clear each room. Not so with these guys. Howe used a silver looking canister to spray at the door edges. It's a fast hardening cement. If a room needn't to be cleared, they just sealed it with cement. Anybody who wants to come out, would take at least a couple of hours.

Nobi was with the Gold team. The lead man had a shotgun slung beneath his assault Verp. He fairly blew holes in the doors they encountered, instead of the more slow and traditional breaching charge method. "_Gotta remember to get me one of those."_

The assault train kept going down the stairs toward the security rooms,sealing the doors with cement as they went. They came to a slimy looking door marked in some strange language. The breacher motioned with his hands for Nobi to come forward. He tapped two fingers to his helmet, reduced it to one. Nobi understood, the universal sign for a quiet entry, he'd seen them in the arcade games often enough.

While in the corridor Howe is trading shots with the-force-knows-what alien mercenaries, their staccato blaster fire echoed with Red Team's silenced shots.

Nobi took a pocket sized box, covered with stickers from Coruscant comic books out. The breacher and assaulters stacked up on either side shook their heads in quiet dismay. He took out Min, his favorite disruptor, and held it over the door access port. He held out his fingers 3,2,1, and jabbed it in.

The door hissed open at once. Nobi now had the perfect opportunity to see the clones conduct a textbook perfect takedown. The first man goes right, the second man right behind him sweeps his Verp left to clear the room. The electronics are humming quietly.

_All clear._

_It's quiet._

_Too quiet._

Howe came in from the corridor.

"It's your show sir. Disable the security systems, jam the doors…and" Howe never did finish his sentence.

A large swine looking creature swinging the largest axe Nobi has ever seen sprung out from the behind the chair with foam in its mouth. It's shriek almost ruptured Nobi's eardrums.

Before it could take a swing, the breacher blew the axe out with his shotgun. That didn't seem to slow the creature down at all. The clones fired their Verps at point blank range. They bounced of its thick skin. The breacher was thrown towards the wall, the rest of the team seeing that their rifles have no effect on the creature, extended their Vibroblates sheath in their gauntlets, and jumped on the mad creature.

Howe hung on its arm, and kept stabbing trying to find a weak spot. He was smashed against the console and chairs, but he hung on.

Nobi ran behind the creature.

"AHHHH!" screamed Nobi, and stuck the muzzle of his weapon point blank in the creatures head and pulled the trigger on full auto.

The head exploded like a watermelon.

Suddenly Nobi's stomach turned into an acid ball. He ran over to the corner and started retching, belching out the previous breakfast, lunch and dinner.

"Have a drink sir," it was the breacher, "that was real dikut."

Nobi still looked pale. "Thanks, uh……" Nobi glanced at a purple spraypaint graffiti on the breacher's armor, "Slug."

"Doc!" barked Howe, "Make sure everybody's REALLY okay. Nobi, sir, get cracking on the terminal. We don't have much time."

While doc ran his armor analyzer over every one, prescribing a few pain medications here and there, Nobi sat down at the strange console.

Back on the roof of Jabba's Palace.

"Target, heavy repeating blaster, 821 meters, push two left," whispered Sat into his helmet comlink. Sat was behind a spotting scope, basically a portable telescope with laser range finders and wind computers, calling out targets for Kayla.

Wham. The sound of a slug the size of warra nuts can, magnetically accelerated over 5 times the speed of sound, washed over Kayla.

"Hit, hit, hit," observed Sat.

Kayla and the roof security team were using oversized magnetic rail sniper rifles to pick off targets below. The palace itself is situated on a small hill, while the village below, popularly called Merc Ville, sits in the valley. To approach the palace one must cross a stone bridge, that is lined with shanty shacks, of the poor trying to sell their wares to the rich inside the palace. The whole village is a hive of the force-knows-what. Criminals, mercs, convicts, escaped or not, lived there to do Jaba's bidding.

Chink kink! The sound of Kayla cycling the oversized sniper rifle's bolt. "Call it out."

"No more targets on the bridge this time, Kay, I….down!" screamed Sat.

Wham, a huge explosion rocked just below their position.

"Target tank, beyond the ridge, range 1,850 meters, fire when ready," observed Sat.

Before Kayla could squeeze of another shot, the tank's heavy machine guns opened up on them. Everybody scrambled for cover, as thick lead poured around them. Kayla snuck a quick look.

"Sat, there's 6 tanks charging for us right now. The mercs are running behind them, using the tanks for cover. I don't have a shot. We can't let them cross the bridge to reinforce the palace. Howe's team will be clobbered on the inside, along with that newbie Jedi. "

Another wham! Three clones were down screaming, hit by shrapnel.

"Osik," muttered Sat, he accessed his radio control panel mounted on his arm. "Juliet six four, target grid square 1/24 requesting roba shells over."

"What's roba?" inquired Kayla.

"Radiation burst shells, from the Majestic, should knock the electronics of their tanks to osik."

The radio crackled, "………unable,……….reposition……….."

Another wham! This time the shells when high and detonated on flag pole above them.

"Sat you gotta get rid of that tank. It's killing us. Get those torrent fighters back to blast them! " yelled Kayla over the din noise. _Never met a creative clone before._

Suddenly she heard Sat scream into his radio, "Lucy Lucy, need you on the bridge. We are on top of the palace I say again on top of the palace. Your targets are 6 brown tanks, 6 brown tanks on the bridge. Friendly position is marked by a flagpole on top of the palace. Requesting you strafe them. Acknowledge!"

For a second nobody could spot them. The Torrent pilots flew in low, up sun, on the deck.

The tank drivers never knew what hit them. The lead Torrent blasted them to oblivion.

"BDA is 100! 6 Tanks destroyed. Thanks guys," said Sat.

Suddenly a missile streaked out from one of the flimsy huts and struck the Torrent fighter right behind the ion engines. The heavy fighter began losing altitude and crashed into the dry river bed.

"No chute! I don't see no chute!" screamed one of the clones.

"They'll be more where that came from. That village, that whole village, ain't real Republic lovers, tell Howe he'd better hurry, or we'll be running out of ammo real soon." Kayla resumed her heavy sniping.

Back in the control room.

_All right, just like old times. So much for the stand up, feel-the-force, do nothin' bad, steal nothin'bad jedi._

Howe was standing over his shoulder. "Unlock the cell blocks, should keep the guards busy, while we do our sneaky peaky," said Howe. His armor still caked by the monster's vaporized brain matter.

Nobi's fingers were a whirl on the keyboard, he was in his element, hacking, corrupting data. All in the name of good fun. "The doors are coming open, now!" said Nobi excitedly.

The clones crowded around the security cam monitors. The cell doors swung open.

But no prisoners come rushing out. Something was wrong.

"Hey where are the prisoners? The Hutts usually have thousands locked up in this place," observed Howe.

A big explosion knocked them of their feet.

The Hutt mercs are in the corridor. Howe's clones were holding them off. Suddenly there were big holes appearing in the wall. Somebody found themselves a heavy repeating machine blaster.

"Down!" screamed Howe, yanking Nobi down.

"Grenade!"

The raiding party all rolled away on the ground, as two grenades were lobbed towards them. The explosion lifted Slug a foot off the ground. Nobi hasn't noticed he's still busy typing away madly on the controls.

"My turn," said Slug. He undid his bandolier, and proceeded to pull out all the pins in the grenades. "Cover me!" Howe laid down a burst of Verp fire to keep the heads down. Slug tossed the whole bandolier down the hall. The mercs seeing that, were running wild, trying to get away from the ticking bandolier. Howe cooly picked them off. But there were more and more of them.

Nob was perplexed. He opened all the cell doors, peaked through all the security cams. Where are the prisoners? Have the dikut Hutt fed them all to his Rancor pet? But there's one door he couldn't hack open. It was a cell behind the Hutt's throne room.

"Hey Howe, take a look at this," said Nobi.

Howe waltzed over through the gunfire like nothing was going on.

"I've opened every cell door, and all the security doors on 3 levels. No prisoners. Wouldn't be the first time the dikut intel weenies get it wrong. I've also released the fire sprinklers on all level 'cept our level, cool eh? Make 'em wet."

Howe was flipping through his rifle's selector switch in a rhythmic click click. He was clearly getting impatient with this young pip squeak of a Jedi. "Your point?" asked Howe impatiently.

"If you stop that annoying click click, I'll come right to it. There is this one cell block right behind the Hutt's throne room. It has a manual lock, not connected to any system. An old fashioned Tate's rebarred iron lock with a key. And it's occupied."

"Your point?" Howe was getting impatient.

"Whoever is in that cell must be pretty important, for the Hutt to keep him isolated from the system like that."

The gunfire was picking up.

"Our mission objectives are to…. " Howe took a moment to realize that nobody had actually told him what the mission objectives were. He was just a Sergeant. A good one, but not an officer. This little Jedi here WAS the officer. And nobody had told him either.

"Look, Howe, this could the intelligence coup of the century. The Hutt's utmost secret," said Nobi.

Suddenly Howe relented. "We're going to need more men. The Hutt's throne room is on the second floor. There's only two access points. The veranda in front, and from the dungeons underneath. Both ways are no go. It's too heavily guarded. Unless…."

"Look, Sir, on the way in I spotted a large glass thing. They must let natural light in somehow right? So we rappel down on the outside walls, I blow the windows with charges, we lob some incendiaries in, should cause a commotion, we swing right through after that," said Slug.

"Slug, why does all your plans require an innately large amount of bombs and grenades?" asked Howe acidly.

"Well, I like things that go boom," said Slug deadpan.

"To the roof then, Slug you have the lead. If it's not screaming Republic blow it away. Nobi you're in the middle with Doc. We can't have our lovely officer scratch a fingernail. The rest of you men, you know the drill," barked Howe.

Howe's team burst on to the roof to find Sat crouched behind a ledge with a comlink to his ear, his broken helmet lay beside him.

"Danger close! Fire for effect! "

Nobi saw the clones all tuck in with the helmets against their chin. He was peering over the edge to see the village below.

"Dumbass get down!" a hand yanked him down.

At first it seemed like multiple lightning flashes, except that they were green. They came like fingers of an angry deity, streaking down. Where ever the beams touched, there was an enormous thunderclap explosion. Speeder bikes, huts, people and aliens all fell a like. Nobi could feel the shockwaves reaching him on the roof. The Majestic in low orbit was firing her canons in support of the raid.

"Check fire! Check fire! Nothing left to shoot, " Sat yelled into his comlink.

"Some Jedi," snickered Kayla. Then she turned to Howe, "What's up?"

"Our Jedi officer here wants to storm the Hutt throne room. Slug's idea was we rappel down and conduct an explosive forced entry from the roof. Some kind of locked up cell he wants to look at," replied Howe.

"Two days a Jedi and you're already starting to turn mystic on us," Kayla shook her head.

"Two days? I thought Jedi were trained from birth." Howe was a little shocked.

"Not this one," said Kayla.

"Sir?"

"Later Sergeant Howe, later, long story," Nobi was trying to shrug it off.

"And it's not Nobi, it's Noobs Bee, the infamous hacker kid who trashed the Republic Treasury system," revealed Kayla.

"I was trying to _optimize it Kayla," s_aid Nobi.

"Wow nice to meet you in person sir! Didn't know you were a Jedi. Your firewall suppression code was a beaut, and your Trojan? Don't get me started," Sat looked like he was about the fall to the ground and worship Nobi. The tight world of hackers, Nobi was on the top rung.

"Can it Sat," said Kayla, "but yeah, he's got a point. Why would you keep one cell nearby and isolated like that? Must be somebody real valuable."

Howe felt he had to take charge again. "Rope up men! We got a date with the evil Hutt."

Howe and his team plus Sat and Kayla, tied the rappelling gear which looked like a cigar folding out to a flower petal.

The ALC harness made it easy. They could just walk down the walls vertical. All of the clone assaulters had small handheld blasters out.

The view was breathtaking, the smoking city and a 2 kilometer cliff below them.

_They said help the weak, feed the poor, nothing about hanging by a thin rope over 800 meters of nothingness. _ Nobi was getting slightly scared.

They walked down the walls slowly, and deliberately, trying not to make a sound. Suddenly Howe held up a fist. Everybody went motionless. Howe then, in a show of great climbing skills, went inverted, and crawled down the last few meters, to peer down the giant glass window.

Nobi strained to look. Howe flipped himself up right and made a series of confusing hand gestures, indicating the enemy and room positions. Everybody nodded, except Nobi. Then Slug went inverted and began his deadly work. He placed a long line of Det Cord along the edges, and stuck a big satchel charge right above the frame, for extra shock effect. The Det Cord would unhinge the glass and the satchel charge would blow the fragments right into the room. After five agonizing minutes, Slug swung back up and gave a thumbs up.

Slug made a fist. Everybody froze. He tapped his grenade pouch and pointed to everybody. The clones began passing their flash grenades to Slug. He then wrapped it in duct tape, all together 12 of 

them into one big ball, and passed the Howe. Howe seemed to like the contraption immensely. Nobi could feel the man was actually smiling beneath his helmet.

The Howe started their count down over the comlink.

"Stand by, Stand by, in 3, 2,"

Nobi never got to hear the one. Slug twisted the handle on his H-204 remote box, or more popularly known as the Hell Box. It was a fitting name. The frame charges blew first. The glass now stood without support, then the satchel charge blew, sending the deadly fragments at supersonic speed into the room. The ringing hasn't stopped in Nobi's ear, when Howe went inverted, pulled the pin on his deadly gift and tossed the whole package inside.

What followed was right up there with a super nova. The magnesium lined grenades produced a brightness the rivaled the sun, Howe has just tossed in a dozen. Any unprotected eye would have the retinas burned out of their socket.

Nobi gripped his SA-15 compact assault rifle harder, this is it. When Doc grabbed his arm and shook his head. Howe had told the Doc that Nobi were going to wait hanging up here with him, until the baddies were taken cared off. Nobi was disappointed.

Howe and his team swung through the broken window. Nobi looked to the right and saw Kayla, with her oversized sniper rifle, swung down with him.

Nobi heard two shotgun blasts, and the all hell broke loose. There was more gunfire than Nobi has ever heard in all his life. The rhythmic tones of repeating blasters, the smaller clack of projectile launchers, the occasion woosh of a rocket launcher. Since the clones' Verp rifles did not make a sound, it was difficult to keep the score by listening alone. It seemed to him that the gunfire, is being silenced one by one. Then the distinctive sound of Kayla's magnetically accelerated sniper rifle roared, answered by another frenzy of shooting, then all was silent.

Doc nodded in his helmet, and gave Nobi a thumbs up. Nobi swung down to the window after him. His feet landed on some shards of glass. On a second look, the glass was black, burned by the superheated air blast of the explosion.

The scene was a complete mess. What was once a Hutt throne room, looked like a tornado has swept through it. No furniture was without holes, no table was left upturned. And there were 60-70 moaning, groaning bodies of various species. Nobi glanced over to see Sat putting a Verp round in each one of them.

"Rule number 33, always make sure they're dead," shrugged Doc.

"After they were blinded, the dikuts were shooting each other blind," said Slug jovially. "All we had to do was duck," he chuckled. "When they realized they're killing each other, they stopped 

shooting. Smart, but not enough. Then our Republic Intel agent friend fired a shot, a single shot. Then they opened up on each other again. Ducking, great weapon," observed Slug.

Sat was finished with his grim duty and was bending over a door behind the Hutt throne. "It's a triple cipher lock, never seen one of these before."

"Enter the wrong code three times, and it goes into auto lock down for 24 hours, yeah I know. You can crack it, but it's gonna take a while to compute the permutations," said Nobi. Sat was treating every word from Nobi as divine.

"So we need a password," said Howe. Suddenly Howe kicked the brown mass the Nobi first thought was some weird sofa from Utapau. "I know you're not dead. I'm here to make sure,"

A deep rumbling voice.

_Ho Ho Ho. The mighty Jedai. Come into my home. Ho Ho Ho. Your clone pets too, ho ho ho._

Nobi suddenly confronted with this creature who ran protection rackets, prostitution, drugs trafficking, and a lot other bad stuff, suddenly felt very small.

"What is the password?" he asked in a shaky voice.

_Ho Ho Ho, they run out of Jedai? They send children now. _

"Answer the Jedi!" yelled Howe, and put his boot down on the Hutt's long tail.

_OHWG! We Hutts can withstand a lot of pain, that method does not work with my kind. Ho Ho Ho. _

"Doc! Bring the judge. We don't have a lot of time," bellowed Howe.

Doc walked over with the biggest syringe Nobi has ever seen in his entire life. It was a foot in length, that was only the needle. It was filled with some clear liquid Nobi couldn't decipher.

_Ho Ho Ho, truth serum won't work with me, Ho Ho Ho._

"It's not truth serum," said Howe. "It's water from your public 'freshers."

The Hutt's eyes went wide as a dinner plate. If there was one thing Hutts were afraid off, this was it.

."You know, all your guests, your mercs, they eat your good food, gotta dump it somewhere. Imagine all that microorganisms, all those cutey little germs eating you up from the inside. Oh you're gonna live, it's not gonna be pleasant though. So what's the password?" asked Howe pleasantly.

Howe stuck the syringe in the Hutt's tail, green slimey blood sputtered out.

_ You Jedai. You cannot do this. Love, peace, you Jedai!_

Nobi said nothing.

Howe started to plunge the needle.

_I don't know._

The syringe is now down halfway.

_You fools just shot the jailer. He knows the code. _

Everybody stopped to look around the corpses.

"Oh what the hell, life's short," chuckled Howe, and continue to plunge the needle.

"Cover, everybody! Cover!" screamed Kayla.

There was a mad scramble. Now everybody was taking cover behind the Hutt's wide throne. There were footsteps, it grew louder and louder. Sounded like an army. The Hutt's reinforcement has finally arrived.

A scaly Transdoshan with a nasty looking submachine gun mumbled something to the effect of _You are surrounded._

Wham. Kayla shot him dead where he stand.

_ Don't shoot! Fools Don't shoot! You will hit me, not them._

The Hutt screamed, caught in the cross fire.

The mercs were thinking, should they save this creature, their hideous boss, or should they take their luck with the new one. They decided with the latter, and opened fire with everything they got.

"This sucks! Men, use the Hutt as cover they won't shoot at him!" yelled Howe.

Just then the Hutt slumped over dead.

"Crap! There goes our cover!" said Slug who was in the middle changing magazines.

"No! Crap! There goes our code!" screamed Sat over the gunfire.

"Nobi can you get the door open?" asked Howe.

"Not this week Sergeant," said Nobi, frantically trying to clear his jammed weapon.

Howe looked around; they were not a good situation. The assaulters relied upon speed and surprise to overwhelm their foes, but this was turning out into an evenly matched gunfight, the worst 

kind of situation. He had 5 of the best assaulters in the galaxy, plus a sniper, and a Jedi, but it will all be worthless if he couldn't get the damn door open and flank the enemy.

"Osik!" cursed Howe. He looked around and spotted a statue of some scaly Transdoshan war hero hanging to one side off the now dead Hutt's throne. "Kayla, full cover! Slug you're with me!"

Kayla raised to her full profile and head shot two mercs in rapid succession. Sat was firing on full automatic, sweeping the mercs' position with a hail storm of projectiles.

"Try aiming," said Doc, "it helps." Sat didn't hear him.

Howe and Slug ran full speed to the statue. Howe tried to move it, but the head was fixed to the ceiling. Slug read his mind, and blew off the head of with the shotgun mounted under his rifle.

The Transdoshans were enraged, and were preparing for an all out charge. How dare the test tube clones desecrate their holy leader like that. The charge was over before it began as Nobi picked off the leaders before they could run three steps.

"Smoke! I need smoke!" screamed Howe. Sat tossed two black smoke grenades from his position behind the dead Hutt. Thick black smoke belched from the grenades.

Now they had some cover. Howe and Slug dragged the statue over.

"Sergeant, this ain't a good time for souvenirs," said Kayla as she was snapping on a thermal scope to her sniper rifle, to see through the smoke.

"So much for hi-tech slice and dice three wrong codes and it locks. Let's do this the old fashioned way. Doc, Sat help me out. We're going to use this as a battering ram. I saw it in a holovid."

Kayla and Nobi looked each other. Clones LOVED holovid serials.

"Kayla, Nobi, you two are going to have to cover us, we need all the big muscle we can get," said Howe. The clones began stripping their ammo pouches, grenades, and rifles off and tossing them to Kayla and Nobi. The two would have to hold off the invading horde. 30 against 2.

Kayla glanced at Nobi gauging for reactions. The kid was scared, but he wasn't about to back down. "Okay, Howe, on my mark, three, two, one go go go!"

Nobi tossed 2 grenades in rapid succession, while Kayla swept the area with automatic gunfire from Howe's Verp.

Howe and his party rammed the statue in the steel door. It made a dent.

"Heave ho!"

They rammed it again, and again.

Kayla's Verp jammed again. "Osik!" she switched to her handheld blaster. They were beginning to work in rhythm. One would provide covering fire, while one would be reloading.

Nobi concentrated first on moving targets. But pretty soon he realized that accurate fire was coming from the non moving targets! The running guys can't hit anything, the guys who take their time to aim, those are the dangerous ones.

Slam! "Put your backs into it," commanded Howe. A hole, the size of a trash ball was beginning to emerge.

One merc tried to flank them, but Nobi shot him before he could get anywhere. "Loading!" yelled Nobi to let Kayla know that he's reloading. Pop the magazine release, slam in a new clip, press the bolt release button. _Piece of cake, 'cept for all these guys trying to kill me._

Kayla dumped her sniper rifle, as was using Slug's shotgun. It made a deafening roar, while the slugs tore heads and limbs right off the owner.

Then Slug landed right next to Nobi along with Howe's team. Panting, hard, he said, "Sir, we made a hole, around your size. You're our smallest team member. I think you can fit in. Here these are shaped charges, crawl inside, and place them on the hinges. They will blow outwards, you should be quite safe."

Nobi had the imagination off being stuck in the door, with mercs shooting his butt off. _Okay, he had to run to the door without being shot, wriggle through the hole, go face to face with the force-knows-what inside, place the charges, blow the locks. Yeah, real simple. _

"Look I'll go, he's just a kid," said Kayla, stripping off her web gear.

"No. I'll go, I'm a Jedi, I'm bulletproof," said with determination.

Kayla started to say something profane.

Nobi stripped off his helmet that Howe insists he wear, his ammo pouch, his backup blaster, his hacking tools emblazoned with comic characters, and finally his Jedi coat. Only two days old, and it looked so old, soaked with sweat and grime.

"Sir, here's a flare, it's gonna be dark in there. When you get in, twist and pull the top," said Sat helpfully.

"Twist and pull," Nobi was scared. But he was the officer, the Jedi, a Jedi knows no fear. But somehow, Nobi was full of it right now.

The gun fire was overwhelming, the mercs has stopped flanking tactics, they were just pouring lead on.

"Hey Howe!"

"Yes Nobi?"

"Cover me," they both laughed out loud, knowing that was impossible.

"Suppression fire!" ordered Howe. The whole team opened up with everything they got.

Nobi ran with all his might to the door. Bullets and blasters splattered behind him as he ran. Now that he saw the hole. _How am I gonna fit through that? _ Nobi tossed the soap bar like explosives, and flare in first, then he wedged himself in the hold. He could feel the hot ion blasts of blaster zinging by his exposed butt.

Sat was past aiming, he was just burning through magazines on full automatic. The laws of probability guarantee he had to hit something. They had to keep the fire off Nobi.

By now Nobi had wriggled half of his body through. But his waist was stuck. _Dikut, gotta lay off those nerf strips. _ Then he realized, what a funny thing that is. One more squeeze, AHHH the force is with me, and he was through.

The room felt dry and cold, not like a prison at all. Nobi swept his hands on the ground, ah yes, found the explosives, but where was his flare? With a great concentration he kept his imagination of Jedi eating Rancor monsters lurking in the darkness in check.

Nobi screamed through the hole in the door, "Give me a…" a blaster ricochet, rung against the door. Osik. _ They can't hear me through the gunfire. I am going to be shot if I stick my head through. Damn, where's my com link? In the helmet .Great_

Nobi felt his way around the door, ah yes, there's the hinge. He put the rubber like explosives on them. One hinge, two hinge. Three hinge.

Back outside.

"Slug," asked Howe over the mayhem, "got anymore grenades?"

There was a muted explosion. Howe turned to look at the steel door.

"You dikut! You didn't pack enough charge!" screamed Howe.

"Wait and see," said Slug smugly.

The heavy steel door slow tipped over and fell with a big bang, there stood Nobi, all blackened from head to toe from the explosion, his clothes were torn, his hair was zinged, but was he was there smiling.

"Alright let's move!" ordered Howe. Each man covered each other as they ran into the door. The mercs saw this chance and began their desperate charge. Howe stood outside the corridor covering everybody as they ran, after a head count, he and Slug hauled the door back up and sealed it with the spray can cement they had used earlier.

The assaulters' helmet mounted spot lamps casted an eerie glow on the room.

It was that dark.

"Sarge, I think I found the power switch," said Sat.

"Why do you think that?" asked Howe, still panting hard after their ordeal.

"It says power on the box," came the smartass answer.

Suddenly they could hear the turbine generators spinning up, the room was slowly lit up. To everybody's shock, it was a very large room, all coated in white paint, spotlessly clean, it was without a question of a doubt, Kaminoian interior, that all the clones know so well.

"This is getting freaky," said Slug, "reminds me of home." For once, no one could argue with him.

Further down the room, they were work tables, with computer systems for crunching DNA data. Test tubes, scopes. It was a small sized genetics lab.

Kayla, noticed on further inspections, there were chairs with restraints, holding cells. What in the force was going on in this place? What kind of monsters are they breeding?

As everybody fanned out, to explore, Nobi noticed a big steel cylinder with a maze of wires and hose plugged into it. Its surface was made of some unidentifiable plastic. Nobi put his hand to touch it.

Suddenly he felt a surge of energy through the force, so strong, flowing right into his veins. With a voice, a voice saying something.

"As I was saying, the Hutts and the Kaminoians illegal exporting cloning technology, the chancellor is going to have a fit," said Kayla.

They all turned to see Nobi banging on the cylinder. "Hello? Are you in there? Knock back if you can hear me."

"Sir, why don't you have a drink, it's been a rough couple of days," said a concerned Howe.

"Howe! There is somebody inside thing. Help me get it open," ordered Nobi. He was brooking no arguments for this one.

"Sat, Slug! See if you can find some kind of switch. To open this thing," barked Howe, always the Sergeant. The kid had proved to him and his men, that he was not afraid to put his life on the line, by wiggling through the door with his butt getting shot at.

The mercs were trying to get through the door, but the cement was holding.

Nobi was probing around the cylinder, the same strong force flowing through him. Then the cylinder popped with a hiss. It unfolded like a flower to reveal a……. a woman with long flowing green hair. Tied up in a straight jacket.

When she opened her eyes, it was blood red. Nobi removed the torture gag from her and cut her arms free.

Upon closer inspection, she was a very beautiful woman, a bit older than Nobi. Nobi was 16. She looked back at him with those blood red eyes, where the whites are supposed to be. Nobi found himself lost for words.

Out of nowhere, Kayla pointed a gun at her. "Careful Nobi, I saw all these restraints, if she wasn't dangerous why would they lock her up so tight like that?"

"Back off Kayla!" argued Nobi. "Look she's probably part of some freaky Kaminoian, Hutt experiment. I don't know what those bums did to her, we're getting her out."

Suddenly the woman raised herself to her full height, she was as tall as the clone commandos. She was very very fit and muscular. She was a lot taller than Nobi for sure. More rifle safeties clicked off.

"Stand down Sergeant!" ordered Nobi. "All of you, stand down!"

After a moment, "At ease men," echoed Howe. The clones relaxed a little.

Nobi turned to the woman, "Sorry about that, they can get pretty jumpy sometimes. Hi I'm Nobi. Jedi, Paddawan, of the eh, Jedi Order," Why was he blabbering anyway? "Please to meet you, please to rescue you."

Nobi could feel Kayla and the clones rolling their eyes.

Her eyes soften, "Uh, nice to meet you too. Uh my name is……. Uh I don't know my name. Strange that I don't, " she said, all childish cuteness.

"I hate to spoil the moment for you guys," interrupted Sat, "But the rest of the assault force is now extracting, and I saw a doorway down the hall, that says emergency exit."

"Count on Sat to look for exits, Fleet people," snickered Slug.

"Look," argued Kayla, "we don't even know she's a human or some strange genetics contraption, a virus carrier, or something weird."

"Can it Kayla, we're going. Sergeant Howe, Sat, scout out the exit, Slug rig a trap for the door, see if we can discourage the mercs not to follow us."

The clones were impressed, first he braved getting shot in the butt, now he's acting like a real officer for a change.

Nobi gave the red eyed woman a wink. She gave him back an innocent smile.

Nobi watched Slug, the explosives expert do his handiwork. "You see commander, traps for the most part work on a psychological level," said Slug, as if telling a bed time story. "You set up one off, you destroy the morale of the guys following you. Everybody is afraid to move one step." Nobi observed Slug strung up a cable that leads to the pin of a sonic grenade, he set it at eye level. "Everybody looks for something to trip, nobody ever looks straight ahead when looking for traps," explained Slug.

"Alright let's move. Doc you take her, Slug, bring up the rear."

The whole assault train moved forward through the emergency exit. The exit leads to an underground tunnel. Howe reported that he doesn't see the end in sight, but it's a better alternative than having to fight through the mercs again.

They heard a muted explosion behind them. Somebody has set off the first trap. The whole team naturally quickened their pace.

"Doc you got some water?" asked Nobi, "lost mine somewhere."

Doc tossed him a full canteen. Before he could take a pull, he noticed the red eyed woman looking teary eyed at him, he handed the canteen over to her without preamble.

She accepted the canteen with a smile, and drank the whole thing in one gulp. "Never had water so long," she stammered. "Thank you Mister," she paused, "Nobi."

Suddenly Sat's head jerked up. "Sergeant Howe, command just broadcasted that that a massive formation of Sep droid tanks has just appeared out of nowhere. It's headed right for the palace. It's a hole army group, complete with air support, everything. Republic forces are pulling out. They must want this place bad."

"Or specifically, our red eyed friend," observed Kayla.

"Don't matter, we're still getting out of here," replied Howe. "Sat tell command to get us a gun ship for extraction, where ever this tunnel leads.

"Can't broadcast in here Sarge. No signal. We can receive over the low frequencies command net though," said Sat.

Another explosion, somebody hit another trap.

They all ran, hard.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter Two:

Jedi Temple Dormitory Area, 3 standard months ago.

Nobi woke up with a yawn. All the beds were empty. Everybody was awake, except him. He didn't know anybody here.

"_Jedi Masters to train you, we have run out. Fighting the war, the Knights are. Be patient we must," said Master Yoda last week. _

_Great!_

It started out in the 'net café. A group of Jedi Padawans snuck out for some Age of War session. It's a war strategy game that lets you command classic space fleets, land marines, conduct tank war fare, wage diplomacy wars, all in one. Nobi was good, very good at it. So good that the Padawans formed a 5-1 coalition to knock him out first, he managed to beat them all. Nobi had the gift of making sense from confusing bits of information to construct the big picture. Every recon flight, every radio snippet, even the player's expression, told the tale. They complained they Nobi cheated. One thing led to another, a push became a shove, a full out brawl erupted.

Nobi was running through the streets, with 7 young Jedi after him. _Holy! Weren't Jedi blokes peace loving people? _ _No, these were kids, not much older than him, they were not Jedi. _

Nobi didn't look back, his legs were pumping as hard as he can we he ran smack into an old female bum. He landed on top of her.

"Help me please, the mystic mob are after me," said Nobi. On second thought she looked so old, that she would have heart attack before she got up. "Sorry, to bother you Granny."

In a flash the old woman got up, shoving Nobi out of the way. She held her hand up in a way that only Jedi on holvids do. The Padawans after him were stunned.

"4 weeks of agriculture duty on Pahaya for conduct unbecoming of Jedi," she said in a gentle voice.

On second thought the crummy clothes were actually Jedi robes, her wrinkles were actually facial marks _Better stay away from these characters, they're nothing but trouble.! Whoa! A real Jedi Master. Damn! And I just called her the mystic mob. _

Nobi didn't hang around to find out, just as he was rounding the corner, in a seedy area, he snuck a last look. One was trying to blame everything on Nobi, another one was describing how great the game was (_not all Jedi have brains apparently,_)another one was figuring how to avoid to be sent to farming duty. Throughout the shouting, Nobi noticed that the Granny Jedi, as he had taken to identifying her, nodded patiently, taking it all in, _like, like I do._ _Well, it's nice to know another person in the world who listens. _

Nobi waved a cab, none would stop for him. _ Kids do not call for cabs._ This was sick. He was 16, last month, by all rights and legal purposes an adult on Coroscant. He can vote, but he can't drink. Such is the nature of civics.

When one finally stopped, it was the most rickety, dirty old cab Nobi has ever seen. The repulsor lifts were humming in some strange rhythm, the headlights were broken.

"Kyro Towers 17, stop at Yakky's drive through on the corner to 14 street before that," ordered Nobi.

The cab roared off with such acceleration that Nob sank into the seat. When they arrived at Yakky's luckily there was no cue.

"_Welhum to Hackky. What do you hont?"_

_Immigrants! Can't even learn to speak basic properly._

Any how, the Nerf strips were delicious here. Not exactly healthy, but topped off with Surry's special hot sauce, it was paradise.

The cab stopped at his place with a jerk. It was a nice little mansion. His mother was on to her 4th husband. Fortunately her first husband, Nobi's father had left them a small fortune. So they were pretty comfortable financially. The light was on in the entire house.

"Welcome home young master," greeted the servant droid, "we have two guests waiting for you."

"Guests or police?" asked Nobi.

He kept walking towards the living room.

"Neither master," said the droid, "I believe they are Jedi."

Nobi was stunned. There were two Jedi sitting in his room, their distinctive robes and hairdo told the tale. It was the Granny, and the dumb one. On seeing Nobi, they both stood and gave the customary bow.

"Look alright, I cheated," stammered Nobi. "I hacked into the security cams, so I can watch the player's faces."

The two Jedi just stared.

"Other than that, it was an honest match," said Nobi, "Honest!"

The rest was history. His mother and step-father were more than delighted to see him leave. Nobi was happy in a way. _Jedi Nobi, conqueror of universe, here I come._

Now that he got up from bed to see Master Yoda standing beside him.

"Late to wake up, our new Jedi," said Yoda grimly.

"Master please understand, I am not complaining. It's an observation. I've been here a whole week, I've browsed through the entire collection of your war records, from Sith to the Separatists like you told me to. When do I start my training?"

"Oh but a Jedi is never at war, only at peace," replied Yoda.

"Master, no offense, there is a war going on. And cryptic answers ain't gonna help. People are dying. And I want to do my part. You dragged me from my home to be a Jedi, then you let me sit on my butt doing nothing for a week, and you told me you were running of of Jedi, and here I am a Jedi, loafing around" begged Nobi.

Yoda took a deep breath, this one is not a war junkie. He just feels useless sitting around. His analytical mind is going crazy, without something to analyze.

"_Change the galaxy, this one will_," thought Yoda.

"If war is what you lust, then war will you have. To the roof you must go, landing pad 45. Answers you will find there," and Yoda walked away without another word.

_Count on the Kermit for weird answers._

Nobi took the elevator up to the roof. He passed some younger Padawans. They were all looking at his belt, and snickering.

"Hey where's you lightsaber?"

"Maybe he lost it somewhere."

_Damn, no lightsaber, how can I be a respectable Jedi with no lightsaber? Do they issue you one? Or is there some Jedi PX store I don't know about._ He didn't dare ask.

He arrived at pad 45, the view was breathtaking. Coroscont, the entire planet is one city. The higher one lived, the richer one is. He could see the Senate building across. Its magnificent steps, the statues, he was part of that world now, a for real Jedi.

Just then, the same rickety cab landed on the pad.

_WHAT? I'm a Jedi, and I still take cabs? Great master Yoda._

He got in without a word. The Cab roared off the pad, towards the industrial district, pass the Galaxy Mall, the galaxy's for real largest mall. It could take you three months just to browse through half the shops. They finally ended up at the big GAR base, down south.

A clone trooper looked at his face, checked his data pad and waved the cab inside the base. The driver jerked his thumb, the universal sign of _get out._

Nobi got out. Most citizens have never been in one of these bases before. Massive Acclamator class assault ships sat fueling from the docks, while crewmen were busy loading provisions. AT-TE, tanks, Torrent fighters in giant hangars were being worked on. It was a sea of white armor. At base, the clones kept their helmets off, so it was amazing to see thousands of the same face, joking, laughing, and sweating.

Nobi didn't know where to go. So he just walked along the piers of one of the assault ships. Out of curiosity, he walked on the pier to one. One of the massive cargo droids, that look like wheels with two arms, were bearing straight down on him, making no move to stop. Nobi spun around and fairly leapt of the pier, panting.

The clones were chuckling at him.

_Nice going Nobi._

A green trimmed armor was fighting the flow of the crowd towards him.

"Attention on deck!" came the projected voice.

The clones stopped lounging and snapped to attention.

"At ease," Nobi said in his best holovid voice.

The clones went back to loading the giant ships.

"Sorry sir, I've been looking for you. You didn't check in at the gate?" asked the green trimmed clone.

"Kinda obvious isn't it?" observed Nobi.

"Oh introductions, how rude of me. I am Sergeant CT64/3484, of the 6th Reconnaissance Wing. You can call me Stack," said the green helmet.

"Uh, I am, uh Jedi Padawan Nobi Khun," answered Nobi.

"We know that sir," if he didn't have a helmet, Nobi could sense the man was smiling, "Now if you will please follow me to our Wing's hangar."

Nobi struggled to keep up with Stack, the man, even with all his armor plates on, slid down stairs, ran up escalators so fast that Nobi was panting. Finally they ended up beside a huge half cylinder hangar on the far end of the runway.

The hangar had 6 LAAT/I gunships lined up, and a couple more fighters Nobi couldn't recognize. There were clones working on them. Stack led him to a small office, off to the side of the massive entrance.

"Officer on deck!" someone shouted. Nobi fairly jumped at the sound of 20 boots coming together.

"Take a seat men," said one of the red trimmed clones. "Command has finally relented and bought our idea. Jedi Nobi here is to be our mission commander. Commander?"

All eyes were on him now. _A Jedi never lies. He saw it on a plaque in the Great Dining Hall. _"Hi, I'm Nobi. And," he paused. "A cab picked me up at the Temple, and, I don't know what I'm doing here."

20 pairs of eyes rolled to the ceiling.

"Another balls up," complained Stack. "I'll make it short commander. We here at the 6th Reconnaissance Wing don't actually conduct any reconnaissance. What we do is deep penetration strikes. Droid factories, armories, unreachable targets, we blow them up. Now for the past six standard months the Seps had moved their factories around. It's getting difficult to pin point. They're getting better at this cat and mouse game. So Captain Red there, thought since we have the capability to conduct hit and runs, why don't hit, grab, and then run."

Nobi looked confused.

Red stood up and paced around the front of the room. "Since we don't get much intel from dead droids, it is hard to pin point their supply system. What I proposed couple of months ago, was that we grab our own intel. For example, we know the Banking Clan finances the Separatists with loans and bonds. All that money has got to go somewhere. The dikuts still have their public shareholder meetings, even advertise on the holonet! I'll let Howe talk now, he came up with this part of the plan. Howe is from Special Forces. Sergeant Howe?"

Nobi noticed that his armor was very different. It was scratched in a million places, and it looked thinner than regular clone armor somehow. It also has a lot of attachment points, for the-force-knows-what.

"We grab them, that simple," said Howe. Even though a Sergeant, he had such a commanding presence, that Nobi felt he was the de facto leader.

"We pack our strike force into a modified Acclamator. Captain Red here will jump out from hyperspace as close to the planet as he can. We come down in gunships, land in front of the building in question. Me and my assaulters can kick down the door and have them gagged and hog-tied before the explosions stopped ringing in their ear. Mean while, Torrent fighters will be conducting suppression of enemy air defenses. We herd the whole parade on one of those cargo type gunships, lift off. ARC-170s will fly top cover for gunships and the Torrents, back to the Acclamator. Captain Red will then recover the ships, and jump to hyperspace right from orbit. We'll be back here in time for dinner, plus the prisoners."

"Sounds like a good plan Sergeant. Where do I fit in?" asked Nobi.

It was Stack this time, "Coordinating a mission this complex, truth is nobody here can do it. There are too many assault elements, too many units operating in concert within a very short time frame. We asked for a Jedi 4 months ago," explained Stack.

"You're him," summarized Captain Red for the benefit of Nobi.

_And the truth shall set you free. _"Guys to tell you the truth, I'm very new at this."

The clones assumed he was talking about new to their operational concept.

"I play, well, used to play Age of War," heads nodded in recognition.

"It works similar to our command and control network," said Stack, "we play it sometimes to test our new tactics against the AI."

"'Cept that real people are dying in this game," this was from Howe.

Nobi was beginning to get Master Yoda's plan for sending him here.

"Look, the reason why I'm so good at the game is that I know the capabilities of each unit intimately. I know what they can do and what they cannot do. I know their weakness, I know their strengths. " Nobi took a deep breath, "If you really want me to coordinate the mission, I need to know what each of you guys do, not just a briefing, I need to be out there with you guys. "

The room was silent.

Nobi was living up to the image of the Jedi.

Red broke the silence.

"Okay," said Captain Red, "That's just fine with us. First thing off, Stack will show you how to fly. Not the standard civvie 3 degree standard turn, but REALLY fly. Howe will take you through his shooting house, and you'll experience first-hand what a crack assault team can do, and you will be on my bridge to see how deep space _tactical_ maneuvering works. Dismissed."

"Sir, this way," said Stack. Nobi followed him to a parked LAAT/I gunship in the hangar. Nobi was used to seeing them over open skies, this close, it's huge. "You go up in front." Stack punched a button, and the side of the cockpit snapped out to reveal climbing stairs. "In you go." Stack began strapping Nobi in. In front of Nobi were a center mounted joystick, and a side controller. In front, there were about a dozen different screens, targeting computers, moving maps, Nobi was overwhelmed.

"Don't worry about the avionics just yet, Commander. We're gonna concentrate on just _flying _ this baby."

Nobi found a pair of headphones and plugged them in.

He heard, "Starting one, starting two." Nobi heard the ion engines spool up to the proper temperature. "Activating repulsor lifts!" a rhythmic whine began to growl. The gauges at first spool up to red, and then green.

"Sir, you probably piloted speeders and stuff before. They're using repulsor lift technology. It ain't bad, but it just isn't designed for high performance. This LAAT/I here actually uses both. Two ion engines to propel the craft, and repulsor lifts for altitude control. But what most people don't realize is that the stubby wings on the sides actually produce lift. So what I'm going to show you , commander is how to combine all three laws of physics, to make the LAAT/I the most maneuverable craft you've ever seen. It's not easy, but it can be learned."

Nobi realized that commander is probably a mouthful. "Stack, call me Nobi."

Nobi could hear stack flipping switches, "Roger Nobi."

"Tower, request permission to taxi, take off, blow some holes, and land again," Nobi heard in his ear.

The reply came as a chuckle, "Latty 29 you're cleared for all the above. Watch for inbound Senate traffic at 40,000 feet, stay clear of section grid 4839, over."

"Latty 29 copies all," said Stack.

"Nobi, I'm going to do a high performance climb. The trainer mode will move my controls in sync with yours. Put your hands on them and follow my movements."

Nobi felt the right handgrip, which controls the power to the ion engines move forward.

"I'm going to full military power, the engines have some inertia, they take a couple of seconds to spool up. I'm holding the craft on the ground with the repulsor lift."

The engines were approaching the red line. Then Stack released the repulsor lift control, and they shot out from the hangar in a screaming climb.

The G-forces pressed Nobi into his seat. From the front bubble canopy view, it was exciting. The city rushed by them vertically, then the clouds. After what seemed like an eternity, Stack eased off the climb.

"We're in military air space so there shouldn't be any drunk cab drivers to run into. Try to fly us straight and level Nobi,"

Nobi put his hand on the controls and heard, "You got it," in his earphones.

He pushed the center stick slightly forward to stop climbing. Nothing happened. Then he pushed a little more, now the whole craft was in a descent. He pulled back the stick, and was suddenly in a vertical climb. This went on for a few minutes, then Stack said, "I got it."

The craft was back nice and level again. "The gunship has to be handled with nudges on the control. Don't jerk it. You have to think 2 steps ahead of her. The fast forward motion we have is from the engines, plus having no wing control surface, contributes to the lag in controls you just experienced. Remember the engines drive it forward, the direction, control by the repulsors, and the wings provide lift."

Nobi was trying to take all this in. This was a truly weird craft to fly.

"You got it."

This time Nobi kept the gunship straight and level.

"Use the foot pedals to turn."

Nobi stomped on the left foot pedal. _Easy enough. _ The gunship was turning, but he noticed that the compass heading didn't turn with him. The gunship was now flying in the same direction but sideways. "Uh, Stack, help!" The gunship was now going sideways in a barrel roll.

Stack chuckled over the intercom, "Sorry Nobi, you must be used to driving speeders. In the gunship, turn and bank are different things. To change direction you must use both. Let me demonstrate, I got it."

This went on the whole morning. By noon Stack was teaching Nobi advanced maneuvers, like nap of the planet flying and assault formations.

"The beauty of the gunship is that, even in the slowest of flight, we still retain a good deal of control authority unlike the majority of crafts out there, who wallow and mush in slow flight," explained Stack.

"Stack, let's grab a bite. I'm in for some nerf strips."

Before Stack could say anything else, the gun ship lurched forward followed by an _I got it _from Nobi.

Nobi brought the gunship over near the seedy district getting it into the traffic pattern.

"Look Nobi, rules require that in traffic pattern, the instructor pilot, me, has to fly the aircraft. I got it."

"Okay turn right and down three levels," ordered Nobi, "Stop stop, see that entrance?" It was Yakky's Nerf Strips. Their gunship got in cue in the drive-through, with Stack expertly holding the huge aircraft steady. The gunship dwarfed all the other speeders, the civilians' mouths were opened wide, here it was, a for real assault ship, bristling with canons, turbo lasers, and rockets, and what's worst, there's a kid in the front pilot seat!

Nobi flipped the switch to open the bubble canopy,

_Welhome to hackkys!_

"Two extra large nerf strips well done, and I want extra hot sauce to go with that, you'll gonna love this Stack, oh and two super large Pop ups. When they moved to the receiving window, the waiter's eyes were as wide as a door knob. A huge gunship hovering next to his window, the front canopy open, with Nobi sitting there.

"Now Stack, go straight up to level 105, there should be an abandoned building pad on top."

Stack pulled the gunship vertical slowly as not to spill the drinks. He parked the gunship on the pad Nobi pointed. They both sat in the open troop bay. Stack acted like he never saw nerf strips before, he was eating slowly, as if taking every molecule of taste in.

"This is great stuff Nobi, " said Stack in between munches. "Can I have more of that sauce?"

Nobi was just wolfing his portion down, all that crash course in learning the fly the Larty was sapping his strength.

He didn't know how Stack did it, but it seemed that Stack drowned his super large Pop-ups drink in one gulp.

"So, Stack, how'd a great pilot like you ended up instructing me? I thought you'd be out on the outer rim with the fleet, get the pearls, save the world," Said Nobi.

He took off his helmet. He was missing a left eye. "Oh don't worry about it, caught some shrapnel when my last Larty blew up. Waiting for a replacement eye. Instead of being cooped up in the hospital, I thought I might do some good with the unit back there. "

Nobi regretted asking.

"So Nobi, how did YOU become a Jedi? I know they don't grow 'em in vats like we do."

"I was how do you say, it was an accident."

Nobi told him the story.

"That's some story. A word of advice, sir? Keep that a secret. The troops won't listen to you as much, if they know you just became a Jedi last week. I read a lot. I read anything I can get my hands on. I know that Jedi training at first they focus on the peaceful stuff before the combat stuff. In your case, sounds like they're ready to ship you out to war at the first notice," observed Stack.

"Yeah, I know. In the Temple, they don't teach combat stuff until you're like 19. Yeah, with me, they started off with a combat pilot course. Not that I mind. "

"Yes sir, when you're out there, in combat, it can get pretty lonely. The important thing is not to let that get into your head. Concentrate on the mission, come back home alive. That's more than I can bargain for. Enough of sad stories, let's get back. I have instructions to drop you off at the Jedi temple. "

Nobi was in a powered descent towards the front of the Jedi temple. The gunship was loosing altitude fast in a dive.

"Now remember, pull up at around 100 feet to loose your forward speed. Aim for that space between the two statues," commented Stack. "Remember retard your throttles too soon and you'll sink, add too much and you'll float over you landing spot."

Nobi looked out the canopy to see that he was level with the statues, and pulled up, too late. The gunship bounced on its repulsors and floated back up. Hundreds of eyes were on them now. If wasn't often you see a gunship flying so low and so fast in the city.

"That was Master Yoda watching on the steps! Oh crap," said Nobi.

"Nobi, go around, make another pass, don't worry about Master Yoda or anything. Just fly the ship. You pulled up too late. Watched the angle of attack, now try again."

Nobi prepared for the fast descent again, they roared over pedestrians and Jedi alike. When it looked as if he was going to crash in the statue, he pulled the joystick back. _Airspeed coming down, angle of attack, good. _

From Master Yoda's perspective it looked like the gunship was flying itself into the ground, but at the last possible moment, slowed and made a perfect landing.

"And that's it for today. The cab will pick you up at pad 45 tomorrow, and thanks for the nerf," concluded Stack.

The canopy popped open and the ladder popped out like magic. Nobi climbed down, and Stack rocketed back to base.

"In one day, a great pilot become, have we?" asked Master Yoda

"It was Stack flying. But thank you master Yoda for letting me do this," said Nobi. But master Yoda was gone.

That night, Nobi was the first night Nobi slept soundly since he became a Jedi.

GAR base Next Morning

Nobi walked off the cab with two big paper bags in hand. At the hangar office, everyone was already assembled.

"Officer on deck!" they all stood at attention.

"Sorry I'm late, I got nerf strips and soda pop-ups for everybody."

There was a mad scramble, all military discipline was evaporated. Nobi learned from his room- mate that night, that clone troopers eat tasteless ration cubes all their lives. Rarely, except in civil affairs units, that anyone of them has tasted anything else. Everyone with the exception of Howe dug in. The officers and the enlisted, Nobi learned, treated each other as equals in the GAR. They were brothers after all. Especially in this unit, they simply transcended rank. The objective and results were more important than who salutes who.

"We can forgive our commanding officer for being late," said Captain Red in mid crunch.

"Hoo ahh," the men agreed.

"What's it made of?" asked Howe.

"Who cares," said Captain Red.

"Today Stack is busy on an errand. You'll be with Howe today," Red doesn't envy the Jedi. Howe was from an elite unit in an army composed entirely of elites.

Howe led Nobi to the far end of the hangar, where the LAAT/I gunships were being worked on. Ammo boxes, and food crates were set up as makeshift chairs. A classic chalkboard was set up.

Nobi noticed that the whole hangar stopped whatever they were doing, pilots, officers, engineers grabbed a seat where ever they can to hear what Howe has to say.

"I am sure we all have had enough lectures in our dikut lives."

_Polite chuckles._

"But this is important. What I am about to tell you has been earned in blood. First off, commander, if you have any questions, even an _inkling _of a question, interrupt me. Same for you dikuts in the back," ordered Howe.

Howe now had everyone's complete and undivided attention.

"Your Jedi council files say that you used play for the Rareing Rangers in _Shock Ball._ Though you never did win anything, it was still good sport. For the benefit of the uneducated dikuts back there, shockball is a gunfight game. You shoot each other with electrodes that give you a nasty shock when hit. So I am going to skip the basic infantry stuff," observed Howe.

Captain Red was passing ration cubes to chew on around.

"In all of the combined arms, only the infantry can take and hold a position. Tanks are good for blasing a whole in their lines, air strikes are good but you run out of ammo and fuel before you get anywhere."

That invoked a snicker from the pilots.

"So let's cut to the chase, it's 40 of us against atleast 500 of them. The key to this kind of assault is speed and surprise. We would go in as violently as possible to induce and state of shock and fear into the guys inside the building. The more time the bad guys have to regroup and organize, the harder our job will be done. In my experience, if a building is suddenly filled with lights and explosions, most would just try to find a table to hide under."

Howe began drawing a diagram of a room.

"Now most of you here, by which I mean the assaulters, have conducted unconventional warfare. Raids behind the lines, armed recon, and the likes. But this is what I call direct action. We have some Galactic Marines here, taking over a capitol ship is your cup of tea. Republic Commandos, the classic special forces, guerialla tactics, raids, recon, uprisings, these are the missions you've been used to. Today I will tell you off another kind. You all know Close Quarters Combat, we all been through the shooting house. Well this is CQC on steriods."

"The traditional method of clearing a room, is to stack up on one side and the first shooter goes in and conducts his take. This is useful for small rooms with few occupants. The downside of it is that only the first shooter has guns pointed on target. The second assaulter has to shoot through the first assaulter to get to the target, resulting on more dead clones than enemies."

Some were beginning to yawn.

"What I propose is that as soon as the door is breached, we move along in and L-shaped like so. The first assaulter goes to the left, the second sweeps to the right and move along the sides of the room allowing the third and fourth assaulter to add their fire to the carnage. That way, we tripple of firepower in one stroke."

_There was a collective ahs from the assaulters. _They had been through CQC training and all saw the limitations of it, Howe was going to change all that.

"Which means that a four man team can take on at least 40 occupants in a given target room, if speed and surprise are achieved."

"Now let's talk weapons,"

_There were colletives hooahhs. They all looked very interested._

"The standard DC-17 multipurpose rifle, frankly to say is a piece of osik. You commandos should know it by now, empty a clip into a Transdoshan, he still comes at you. What I like is this,"  
Howe pulled one of its dust case, odd looking short stock rifle. "The SA-15 carbine. Grenade, breaching, and scope attachments are available. It jams a lot, holds less shots, but it packs a heavy stopping power, and it's silent. You all can have a go later on."

"The important thing is not the method, but the purpose of this task force. For too longs those responsible had just been sitting comfortably in their palaces, pointing fingers and sending the poor and unfortunate to die. Well, _TODAY, _it will be diffenrent. We are going after their command structure. We will kick down the door to their private seaside villas and drag them screaming back to Coruscant for interrogation. We will storm their parliament building and grab the whole rotten lot of them for justice."

"How do we know who to grab?" asked Nobi.  
"Just wach the holovids, these guys still make public appearances. We will show them on _live _holovid that the Republic will not stand by. And we _will _win this war."

There was a thunderous applause from the audience.

Apartment Blocks 247 Coroscant Daytime

There was a sea of CSF squad speeders.

_Come out with your hands up, and you won't be hurt!_

"The art of negotiation is wearing the enemy down. Once he has given into one request, more will follow," said Jedi Master Gimwai. Master Gimwai was behind the police line with 5 young Padawaans. Under the Jedi council's new training program, young Padawaans were to be exposed to a variety of real life crisis.

"Mam'm," said Captain Jayler of the CSF anti crimes unit, "we've trying talking to them but they won't budge. Thank heavens no hostages. They've got heavy weaponry, probably stolen from some armory. With this new law, 20 years minimum hard labor, smuggling death sticks, just makes 'em more desperate. By dark I'm afraid they just might try to shoot their way out. And," he admitted sheepishly, "We don't have the firepower to stop them. Budget reasons you see. Can't spare the armory for us lowly CSF."

"You want me to talk to them?" asked the Jedi Master coming right to the point.

Captain Jayler nodded. "Get the lady here a loud hailer." Someone tossed a comlink.

"Now Paddawans, in negotiations like this, you must be strong, for the enemy will perceive any weakness in your tone of voice as a sign of your weakness as a whole." The Padawaans nodded, taking in everyword.

_This is Jedi Master Gimwai. You are surrounded! There is no place to run. If you come out right now, I can gurantee on my honor as a Jedi, and as an officer of the Republic, you will not be harmed._

There was silence.

Then hailstorm of heavy repeating blasters firing for all their worth fell on them. Speeder radiators smoked, winshields shards were flying. The experienced CSF cops ducked faster than the Jedi. That evoked some smirks.

Jedi Master Gimwai crouched behind a speeder with Captain Jayler.

"Now what?" asked the Jedi Master.

But Captain Jayler was already on his radio, requesting GAR assistance.

"I repeat, we have heavy repeating blasters, I don't know how many, estimated over 15 armed and dangerous, yes I know!" Jaylor spoke into his radio.

"Normally I would just go in and just end the situation for you," she patted her lightsaber, "But Jedi do not have jurisdiction on Coruscant. Plus I've got these Padawaans with me, they need to learn the art of negotation," said the Jedi Master over

Captain Jayler made a face. "You Jedi, you're all the same. Upstuck, holier-than-art-thou people. I've called in the GAR, they told me they're bringing heavy artillery."

"You can't just level the entire neighborhood!" exclaimed one of the Padawaans.

"Watch me kiddo," replied Jayler, "This is my city, not yours."

"Master this is not right, we Jedi must revere all life, we can't just blast them into oblivion" protested the young Padawaan.

"Laws are meant to protect the guilty and the rich. Lawyers defend whoever can afford them, for those who can't, they call it _pro bono, _obstructing justice for free," argued Jayler. He was sick of these naïve Jedi. "No wonder we haven't won the war yet with you yuppies as generals," he added.

Just then, Jedi Master Gimwei realized how awfully naïve his Padawaans and fellow Jedi were. Jayler, this unlearned man, was right about everything. The Jedi, they led protected lives, meddled in affairs they seem fit, and ignoring those they could. Yes Jedi do revere all life, it was the princple of the _becoming _ a Jedi. But to see this cop tear it apart like this. Gimwei felt shame.

The radio then crackled, "Captain Jaylor of the CSF, this is Task force Romeo 61, confirm the suspects are in the building that your speeder bikes has surrounded?"

Jaylor replied, "Affirmative. All my people are 50 meters back from the building. It's your show. Apprehend the suspects, if you take fire, deadly force is authorized."

"Copy deadly force authorized," crackled the radio.

"Master, you have to do something. We can't just kill them all," pleaded the Padawan.  
Gimwei felt she HAD to stand up for the Jedi principles their order held so dear. She struck a compromise. "Captain Jaylor, I implore you as a Jedi, don't do this. They deserve a fair trial."

"Trials are for the accused innocent. It would be obvious to everyone except you Jedi that these scum are definitely guilty!" shouted Jayler.

"At least tell them not to fire until fired upon," compromised Gimwei.

After a long stare, he Jayler relented, and radioed, "Rules of engagement are as follows: do not fire until fired upon."

After a long paused, the radio crackled again, "Wilco, standby."

They popped out of the clouds and no one saw them. A formation of 3 LAAT/I gunships dived on the target buidling like angels screaming down . At the last moment, they all split up, one looked like it crashed landed on the roof, the other two landed at the front and back entrance. Heavy blaster fire began to rake the gunships immediately. Gimwei saw that each gunship held only eight clones, decked from head to toe with ammos and grenades.

As fast as the gunships landed, they lifted off in to the air again to act as decoys for the heavy repeating blasters.

Gimwei saw the clones stacked up in front of the door. Their movements sparked of excellent training, each man covering a fire sector, with no muzzle sweeping over his comrade's head. As she looked closely, the second one in the stack is too small to be a clone trooper, looked like a boy so totally out of place.

He wore a brown robe, but was covered by a black assault vest, ammo and big radio strapped to his back. His head was obscured by a high tech looking black helmet with goggles and a wrap-around comlink that went to his mouth. Then Gimwei spotted the telltime Padawaan braid on his hair.

"Wait, that's a Jedi…." She never finished her sentence.

The first clone fired a strange gun protruding under his main weapon's barrel in to the door lock. The unknown Jedi kicked it opened the whole team went through the door in highly trained movements.

Meanwhile the roof team rappelled off the roof, and swung in through the windows.

Gimwei saw flashes and heard several loud explosions. Then there was silence. Then a heavy repeating blaster opened up, more flashes.

Then the radio crackled, "All clear, all clear, bring your paddy wagons up."

Gimwei rushed towards the building along with her five Jedi Padawaan and about a hundred other cops.

The clones came out of the buiding with the prisoners already hog tied and gagged. She watched as they swap magazines, looking like they were ready to go and do that again.

"Wow that quick!" exclaimed Captain Jayler, he was busy congradulating the clones.

Gimwei looked for the black helmeted Jedi. But found him sitting alone on the hood of a speeder drinking water. In this pose, he looked _far _ older than he appears. It's the eyes, it's always the eyes that age first. A holovid photographer caught him in this very award winning pose. He took off his helmet, and poured water over his head. Now Gimwei recogonized him as the gamer kid whom she had personally brought in to the Jedi Order. He was different today, that's' for sure. A boy had become a man, the old fashioned way.

She went over and sat next to him. "Here have another bottle," she pulled her personal canteen which she carried everywhere with her for 30 years.

He turned around and looked. He squinted a bit. "I know you. Master, master,"

"Master Gimwei." She bowed the traditional Jedi way, hands locked together in a knot. He didn't return it.

"It's not like you said you know. Real people die in this sort of thing. I saw in a plaque in the dining hall, Jedi are peacemakers, not warriors." He looked at himself, "well, look at me. From the get go, the Jedi has been training me for war, that's for sure."

Gimwei saw it before, they just stared off into nothingness. The thousand-yard stare, Gimwei didn't expect in her lifetime to see a Jedi with it, especially a young Padawan.

"It's an experimental program. Jedi are dying far greater than the sustainable rate. Something must be done to improve the survival rate. We've decided to include military training in the Jedi studies. It's just that somehow your assigned Master didn't survive to teach you the ways of peace first."

After a while Nobi said, "Master, oh I'll survive alright. I'll survive and come back to learn all about the peace and loving ways of the Jedi Order. But what I see is you are sending children, like me out to die on some unknown battlefield, in the name of the Republic."

"We are Jedi, defenders of the Republic, regardless of age," Gimwei repeated the party line. How many times has she said that?

"Look Master, I can tell you that this war won't last much longer. I'm working with this unit," he suddenly paused.

"What unit?"

"You don't need to know. Just say we're going to win this war pretty soon. The kid gloves are off. I gotta go Master." He grabbed his helmet, and walked over to the landing gunship with the clones without another word.

Gimwei saw that he hadn't touched her canteen.

_By the force. What have we created?_


	3. Chapter 3

Back at the Jedi Temple next morning

Back at the Jedi Temple next morning.

Nobi cracked his eyes open. His room mate dumped a pile of papers on his bed.

"Not bad for a newbie," he said excitedly.

On the front cover was Nobi, with his assault vest pulled over his Jedi robes, sitting there staring off the space. On closer inspection, there was a DC-17 rifle next to him, and his distinctive black helmet sat beside it. The caption read, _Jedi kid soldier saves the day_.

Nobi flipped through the other papers. One had a picture of him pointing his weapon at hog tied hostage laying on the ground. This caption read, Jedi Secret Police Nabs Citizens.

The editorials range from thanking him and the Jedi order from keeping the Separatists at bay to accusing the Jedi Order of sending children off to war.

_The Jedi hung up their robes for body armor, this one had already hung up his lightsaber for a rifle. Next they would hang up the Republic for the Separatists! The Jedi has lost its ways!_

Nobi laughed outloud at that one. Yes, in that picture, he didn't look like the typical Jedi at all. He looked more like a Hutt Mercenary than a peacekeeper. This one is for keeps.

As he ate his breakfast, he noticed some were coming over to chat with him, but most stayed away. _I am a Jedi just like you guys. Minus a Master and a lightsaber or two, ,and oh, don't forget your daily philosophy lessons. _

He was an outsider in an organization which is considered an outsider by most of the galaxy.

When will the mystic Jedi kitchen ever serve Nerf Strips?

Just then the morning daily dose of the morning holovid news came on in the mess hall.

The scoop of the morning was of course, the black helmeted Jedi and his crack clone assaulters subduing Coruscont criminals.

Words like in a _daring assault, leading to dramatic conclusions._

There were footages of him expertly giving commands via hand signals to his assault team. And then the obligatory shotgun breach by Howe, then the rapid entry. The cameras had missed most of the gunship landings.

And in the end there was, _with suspected ties to the Separatist movement._

_Anybody with a gun was tied to the Separatist movement nowadays. To say other wise wouldn't be very patriotic._

Nobi was the only one laughing in hall. They all turned to look at him, unsure of what to do, resumed their breakfast. A couple of really cute Jedi were asking him details of the assault. Nobi reminded himself that female Jedi, no matter how alluring, are basically nuns. But most of their questions were:

_Where did you learn to do that? Which Master taught you that? What kind of gun was it? How come you didn't use a force push to open the door?_

What Nobi want to ask them all was, _How do I get a lightsaber? _

Just then a heavy clack thumped on his shoulder. He turned to find a green trimmed clone trooper Sergeant with a pilot's helmet saluting.

"Stack!"

"I thought I'd picked you up this morning. Seeing the front of the Temple is crowded with reporters of over 318 species from 258 different planets and 128 networks."

Now the whole mess hall was looking at him. First ditching the lightsaber for something more sexy, then having a clone pilot as his chaufer! _Master Yoda must like him. _ They all thought.

Nobi got a plate of fresh fruits for Stack. Stack dug in with his usual monstrious appetite. Nobi anticipating this, got 3 more plates for him. It was always pitiful to watch Stack enjoying every bite as if it was the last thing in the world.

One Jedi Padawan who everyone said was a gifted mind reader, got Stack 3 big sacks of food from the Jedi kitchen.

_So there's more to it, this mystic mob._

"Commander, today we're going to do something fun. Aerial Combat Manuvering"

"Sounds boring, I did it in the gunships," faked Nobi.

"Not in this baby you won't," Stack said between munches.

Nobi and stack took the elevator up the main Jedi Temple hangar. It used to be filled with sleek Jedi fighters. Parked in the middle was a weird long nose two seat fighter with extended wings. On a closer inspection it featured a gunner's seat in the back. A three crew fighter! Whoever thought that one up?

It was three times larger than the standard Jedi fighter. To him it look like coffin with wings.

"This is the ARC-170 fighter. Still in flight testing, Incom was kind enough to part with some for our use." Stack patted the long nose like it was some prized stallion.

"Stack, it's a bus. Look at it. I mean, the tiny droid fighters will fly rings around this thing," interjected Nobi.

Stack looked offended that Nobi called his ship a _bus!_ "Respectfully sir, this thing can go 3,000 knots in standard atmosphere. It's not a BUS! Look at your Jedi fighters, one direct hit and you're toast. This baby, on the hand other hand," Stack ran his hand under the wings, "has a new S-foil system."

"What's a bus foil?" asked Nobi teasingly.

Stack pretended not to hear him.

"In flight the wings extend to radiate heat from the shield generator. Which means anything short of a full bore turbolaser canon won't even scratch this baby."

"Six torpedo tubes, 2 large bore movable laser turrets, two twin charged ion engines, a 1.5 million light year hyperdrive, two deep space radio receivers, and _six _beverage cup holders. Master Nobi, your days of sitting in shuttles with bad food are over," beamed Stack proudly.

A small crowd of Jedi began to gather around the strange craft.

"Since this baby is not in production yet, we don't have the astromech droid, and nobody volunteered for the tail gunner position. So it's just you and me," pronounced Stack.

Like all craft made for clones, this one has a built in step. Push a hidden reccesed lever and the surface beside the cockpit snapped opens to reveal a ladder. Nobi climbed in. He found a helmet and strapped in the front pilot seat. The engine guages alone take up half the cockpit real estate. Laser canon heat, left s-foil heat, right s-foil heat, engine manifold heat, _this thing is a dikut oven! _On his right arm, the hyperdrive control panel sat. A big plastic covered red button says _hyperspace. _The other half of the real estate is the usual flight director, targeting computer, navigation equipment.

"Coms check," Stack's voice blared in his ear. Nobi struggled to turn down the volume.

"Since this baby has a zero zero ejection capsule, and we're sitting in an enclosed hangar, I took the liberty to disarm it. Not in a real mood be _one with the roof._ Now behind the throttle on your left hand should be a battery switch. Flick it to on."

Nobi found the red switch, and flicked it. The screens came to life. Incom's logo followed by a _one pass, haul ass _message. Nobi had to chuckle at the Incom engineer's sense of humor. It probably won't make it to the production version.

"Now since we don't want to be late for an appointment, I'll do the preflight and get us out of here. I'll get you checked out once we're in orbit."

"Burning one!" shouted Stack.

The low rumble of the powerful twin charged engine shook Nobi's insides. He now realized how powerful this fighter is.

"Burning two!"

The rumble became a low pitched whine.

"Tower request permission to take off," Nobi heard in his ear.

"Roger, be advised no aircraft in the vincinity of the Jedi temple," came the voice of a sleepy controller.

The heavy fighter floated forward towards the hangar exit, its repulsor lifts struggling to keep it airborne. Nobi saw the repulsor lift heat guage creep up to red.

"I see it Nobi, we'll stop using the 'lifts in just a second."

Once clear of the hangar, Stack pitched the fighter in a 60 degree climb and firewalled the throttle. Nobi felt his arms were as heavy as lead.

They punched through the clouds and continued climbing, soon the blue skies turned into black. The stars were twinkling much brighter. Nobi, like most civilians have only seen space from the small spaceliner windows. The view from the ARC-170's high visiblity forward canopy was breathtaking. He could see the atmosphere falling behind him. Cororscunt, the whole planet was one city. He could see the twinkilings light, and glow of the morning sun.

"You wanna fly it?" Stack asked over the intercom.

"Yeah sure," answered Nobi still taking in the stunning view.

"Flying in zero g is easy. No air resistance to worry about. You got it."

Nobi grabbed the controls. He tried pulling the stick all the way back. The fighter responded like a heavily loaded gunship. The bank and turns still feel heavy.

"It's designed for long range recon and heavy strike missions. So compared to the dinky fighters, it's not real manuverable. In a straight line the fighters will eat her star dust. This baby is over powered. So use that to your advantage. She can accelerate on a dime, but she doesn't turn so fast," briefed Stack.

Stack then switched frequencies, "Majestic Approach this is Arc 3 niner. We're here, set us up for the approach."

"I got it," said Stack.

A tiny speck of white dot became a small triangle. It grew and grew to become a huge Acclamator class assault ship. Over 752 meters long and 460 meters wide, the assault ship dwarfed the small fighter.

Stack approached the Majestic head on. Flying underneath it, Nobi could look at its array of armor platings, but he noticed the defensive turbolasers were missing.

Then out of no where the fighter shuddered to a halt. Nobi looked out of the cockpit to see that a mechnical arm has caught the fighter and pulled it through ventral hangar. For a hangar designed to hold 80 gunships, it was very empty. A small reception party was waiting for him.

"Officer on deck!" The clones snapped to attention.

"Good day Captain Red. I assume this is your ship," The clones laughed, thinking it was a joke.

"Jedi Nobi, welcome aboard the Majestic," said Red warmly.

Nobi looked around the hangar to see that it has only 10 LAAT/I gunships, 8 Torrent ground attack fighters, and 6 of new ARC-170s.

"They're not in production. How did you get them?" asked Nobi.

"We traded in 320 speeder bikes, 65 gunships, and 17,345 clone troopers for it," answered Red with a laughter. "It's true!"

They took the turbolift to the bridge. It was very crowded. Rows and rows of monitors, and clones were glued to them.

"Usually an Acclamator in planetary assault configuration has 18,000 infantry, 80 gunships, 48 armored walkers, and 36 howitzers. That's 7 million cubic feet of heavy cargo. All that is powerd by a 8 dinky electromagnetic ion engines. That's why Acclamators are not very manuverable and lack strong shielding," briefed Captain Red over the bridge din.

"The Majestic on the other hand, the yard modified her to my specifications. We removed most of her anti aircraft batteires, we vented the unused compartments to vacum, and plus we turn off the clone living quarters life support system. We're also carrying 1/16th of the usual mass. The ship crew numbers 160 instead of the usual 560. We're carrying 120 of Howe's assaulters instead of the usual 18,000. Same with the fighter and gunship compliments."

Nobi was trying to follow Captain Red's monotonous speech.

"Meaning, cutting all the unneeded systems, we can divert more power to the shields and engines. She's 2 times faster and much more manuverable now. More power mean her shields is 400 more effective than the standard Acclamator. Meaning, short of an entire grand fleet shooting at us, we're invincible. Our mission profile calls for us to race our way in set up a protective orbit while Howe does his thing, take a pounding from whatever defense systems they got running, and scramble our way back out before they know their leaders are gone."

Nobi was impressed.

Suddenly a trooper called out, "Fleet HQ reports multiple Separatists ships jumping out of hyperspace. Relative bearing to the nearest moon. Enemy fleet composition 52 droid control ships, 43 Techno Union escort frigates, and 3 unindenfiable ships."

"Alright, battle stations, action stations for torpedoes. Engineering, prepare to give me best possible speed. Shields up," barked Captain Red.

The alarm gonged, every clone race to battle stations. But with the stripped down ships, there was not much to man."

"Bridge, Comms, Fleet command is scrambling the standby fleet, requests that we take the right flank," said the intercom.

The Republic fleet lived up to their reputation. Within minutes a task force of 18 Acclamators and 1 of the new Venator class carriers were formed up in wedge formation, for maximum firepower with minimum profile.

More Acclamators that were undergoing service on the surface were coming online. The emergency task force had to hold the line until their comrades could get to orbit. If the Seps broke through, the other crusiers on the surface or still in the atmostphere would be sitting ducks.

The _Majestic _Bridge

"Commander, I'll narate this as I go. The Seps should fire their torpedoes from maximum range about now, then launch their fighter screen behind the incoming torpedoes."

Captain Red was a pro. The speaker blared, "Conn, Sensor, multiple incoming torpedoes bearing 248."

"Don't worry, they won't be gunning for us. They're probably going to go after the new Venator. Everybody knows Jedi Generals love new ships. A rust bucket like us won't merit their attention. Our fleet will approach them head on, our job on the right flank would be to guard against envelopment."

Nobi was thinking fast. "Captain, this is wrong. Why are we going head to head with them? We're playing right into their hands," said Nobi.

"We have to give time for those dikuts on the planet to launch. We have over 85 Acclamators and various frigates in the yard alone," said Captain Red.

"Conn, sensor, the torpedoes have acquired. We're so close together I don't know who it's locked on," came the excited voice.

"Brace for impact, it might get a _little _bumpy, Commander" said Captain Red calmly. The bridge crew loved him for it.  
Nobi grabbed the nearest console.

The ship rocked with explosions

"All stations, damage report!" shouted Captain Red.

"Conn, sensor, No damage sir, but the _Warrior _took three hits. Some kind of new warhead, went right through the armor plating,"

Out the left window, Nobi saw another Acclamator with three holes in its forward hull. Gasses were esscaping into deep space at an alarming rate. She was listing to port.

"Conn, sensor, second torpedo barrage on its way!"

"Captain Red, from my perspective, if you don't start manuvering, the torpedoes are gonna chew you up, by the time you get in turbo laser range, your ships will be dying."

Captain Red was busy supervising the torpedo firings.

"If we manuver and break formation, those frigates could slip between in the confusion," he said calmly.

"Captain Red, don't you see? They caught you while half the home fleet was under repairs on the surface. Somebody thought this through. What I see is that they will try to draw your formation out, and another fleet will jump in for a pincer movement."

"You don't know that. Besides, that's above my paygrade. You have to take it up with the Jedi Master on the Venator. But I see you point," he paused for a long second, "What else can we do?"

But Nobi already had a plan. "Captain your ship is twice as fast, and much more manuverable than everybody right?"

"Right," the terse reply.

"Plus you got those souped up shields, right?"

"Right," said Captain Red.

"We also have on board a crack assault team who for the past month had done nothing but trained for grabbing high value targets?"

"Right, I know what you're thinking. But first how do we EVEN get close enough to launch the gunships?"

"Get Howe and Stack up here," ordered Nobi.

"Conn, sensor, the Venator just took a hit. She just lost all propulsion.The Jedi in command is transfering his staff to the _Epic," _the speaker blared.

Howe and Stack came running out of the turbolift. Stack asked, "What gives?"

Nobi briefed them on the plan. It was simplicity in itself.

"…if we lower the shields, they'll just think we're another merchant," ended Nobi.

All three clones paused for a moment. "We can't transmit this. One whiff of this over the freqs and we're screwed," observed Howe.

"I'll fly over and inform the Jedi in command myself," thought Stack.

"You'll never make it back it time," answered Captain Red, "we use light signals. I saw it in a holovid."


	4. Chapter 4

Back on Tattoine, under Jabba's Palace

The tunnel ended up on a small knoll overlooking Merc Ville. After being in the dark so long, Nobi squinted to see in the bright Tatooine sun. Kayla, ever the sniper, pulled on a set of sunglasses. The clones all had light filters in their helmets, Nobi could see them tapping the controls on the side of the helmets.

"Calling for extraction.." said Sat into his radio.

Suddenly Howe called, "DOWN!"

A series of large explosions thundered around them. Howe crawled over to look beyond the ridge, a battalion of droid tanks were approaching.

"Get us some air support to blast those tanks now Sat!" screamed Howe.

"I can't, they're jamming us," replied Stack.

Howe looked around. Tatooine was a desert planet. There was no natural cover. Only flat sand. And infantry versus tanks on open terrain, tanks win.

"Howe, we have to move into Merc Ville. It's our only chance. Those tanks will have to crawl into the alleys just to find us," said Nobi seriously.

To Howe, the idea of going into a city that's full of bad guys is no fun. Every doorway, every window is cover for some unknown Mercs waiting to take a pot shot at the clones. The explosions were getting closer, the droids were bracketing their targets. A feminine scream distracted Howe, the green haired woman was hit by a shrapnel to the arm. Doc was on the case, she should be alright. This was getting serious.

"Okay, listen up men. When we get to the city, everybody covers a sector. We've done this in training, it's time to put it to the test. We will be shot at from 360 degrees, so stay on your toes."

They ran the last 200 meters to the safety of the city. Merc Ville is filled with run down 2 stories buildings. There was a mad evacuation effort going on. The Separatist Army supposedly allied with the mercs were shelling the city indiscriminately in their vain effort to get to the clones. Confusion reigned. It was every man for himself.

"I've got Stack on the tactical net!" said Sat excitedly.

Nobi grabbed the comlink off the back of Sat's backpack. "Stack! We need to extract now! I have one high value hostage rescued. I've got a tank battalion chasing me, they're shelling the city. Where are you?"

_"I'm in a Larty 90,000 feet over the city. The Seps have anti air units set up on the eastern side of the city. Every time I tried to descend, they start shooting. Can't get through to pick you up there," crackled the radio._

Howe was way ahead of him. He had an old fashioned paper map spread out and was discussing options with Kayla.

"The air defense units are sited at the round tower to the east here. I'm guessing these are TAR-15 units, range say 7 kilometers in a bubble shape. Missiles on wheels, they're bad news for the gunships. If we could cut through here, we can circle around and end up the bridge on the west side. Stack can pick us up there, nice flat LZ with the bridge railings as cover."

"I don't like it," said Kayla, "we have to cut through this big slum here, no cover, only shacks which won't stop a bullet."

But Howe was gone, he grabbed the comlink from Nobi in mid sentence.

"Stack meet us at the bridge on grid square 38/23, get the Majestic to start a bombardment to the north, so that should drive most of the mercs out."

The red eyed woman looked like she was having a heart attack. Nobi was there in an instant.

"What's wrong? DOC!" screamed Nobi.

Doc start loosening her clothes to prevent shock, he checked her pulse, and her eyes, nothing wrong there. Suddenly her eyes turned even more crimson.

"He's here," she said calmly, "he's here for you."

"Talk to me, who's here?" asked Nobi.

Then she went limp and passed out.

"I don't know what's wrong. This mystic stuff is beyond me. Her pulse is fine, her pressure is fine, her temp is fine, for a human that is. Looks like I'm gonna have to carry her," said Doc.

The team moved out, with Howe in the lead. They bounded from cover to cover. Shooting as they go. One thing Nobi learned was, you can't hit anything if you're running, so they walked, deliberately, in the middle of a war zone. It was crazy. It took longer than usual, for Doc was carrying the green haired Red Eyed woman.

The shooting died down after they reached the slums. What Nobi saw was utter despair. There were Twileks living in the worst of filthy conditions. Humans living on the garbage from the Hutt palace. One child walked up to him and asked if the Jedi were here to help. _Yes, we just got rid of the Hutt for you, but would that really improve your lives?_

The radio crackled again. "_This is Stack, a small Geo landing craft just got pass our fighter screen. We lost it when it went too low in the city. You folks keeps your ears perked."_

"Geo? Who flies around Tatooine in a Geonosian ship?" asked Slug.

Kayla handled that one, "Count Dooku."

The silence was deafening.

"Alright, this is getting freaky, a red eyed woman we found in a tank, Kaminoians, and now Count Cooko wants to play" observed Slug.

Kayla took a look at the still unconscious woman.

"Incoming!" screamed Howe.

Artillery shells screamed down on their position, raking back and forth. The pressure threatened to burst Nobi's eardrums.

"Everybody okay?" Nobi got a bleeding scratch in the face.

"Must have homed in on our radio transmission," said Sat dryly.

"From now on, radio silence. We stick to plan, get to the bridge, set up an LZ, and scram," commanded Howe.

They made their way to the bridge, there was still fighting. Apparently the Separatist decided to wipe out Merc Ville. Getting rid of bounty hunters was good for publicity.

The bridge was quiet, too quiet for Howe's liking. "Everybody take five. We've made it. Just have to wait for the flyboys to come pick us up."

The red eyed woman was just coming to. Doc set her next to a pile of rubble. She was gulping down some water.

"Oh hi Mr. Nobi, " she said all cute and innocent. "I hope I'm not a bother to you."

_What can a guy n say?_

"Of course you're not a bother," said Nobi, removing his helmet and sitting down next to her. On closer observation, Nobi noticed that she was a very beautiful woman. "You said something about someone's coming for me. Could it be Count Dooku?"

"Count Cooko?" she giggled, "Why, that is such a funny name!"

The whole team rolled their eyes. _Great! They picked up a idiot._

Suddenly a loud sound blared, "Surrender! Drop your weapons!"

Howe and Kayla looked around, searching for the threat. Two platoon of droids materialized from the rubbish pile that everybody _thought _ was a rubbish pile.

In the midst of the dusty smoke, Count Dooku and his distinctive red lightsaber strolled casually towards them.

"Paddawan Nobi, you must realize that even with a lightsaber, you're not match for me," intoned Dooku.

Nobi stared at his SA-15 carbine, it shot projectiles not laser. As a sign of curiosity, he flicked the safety off and took one shot at Dooku 300 meters away. Dooku in a smooth motion ignited his lightsaber and blocked the projectile, it did not bounce of the blade like blaster fire, the blade simply vaporized the projectile.

"Cool! Can you teach me to do that too?" The clones and Kayla stifled a laughter. They _know _Nobi was not issued a lightsaber.

Dooku ignored the question. "Hand over the girl, and I will let you go."

Nobi took a look at the green haired woman. She was smiling back innocently oblivious to the situation.

"Over my dead body Dooky," answered Nobi.

The assault droids cocked their blasters, and two droid tanks rolled up by the alley.

"I much prefer you to join us instead of the alternative, you don't even know what she is, you don't even know if she's worth protecting." rambled Dooku. The conversation was a distraction, Nobi could sense the droids moving into a flanking position. A weird thought came to his head, _How does the Seps feed POWs? Better than what the clones get I reckon._

"I am sorry," he raised his hands, the droids took aim, "But I do not have time to play with children."

Howe and the clones looked ready to die in the path of glory, but Nobi saw only disappointment on Kayla's face. While the green haired woman was still smiling around sweetly.

_ This is it, my first mission. We seed the stars! No that's for clones. For Jedi, we barbecue them. We seed the ashes!_

Just then Nobi saw the green beam of a composite laser raking the droid lines, followed by rockets hitting the ground. Then the distinctive sound of a LAAT/I swooped over the bridge. It was Stack. The gun ship dive straight down and twisted in mid air to land parallel to the bridge, pointing one of the turret gunners towards the enemy.

_Always late! _Nobi heard the complaint in his earpiece.

Howe and Slug took up positions to cover the retreat. One would cover another as they ran. The droids were firing all full auto now, aiming for the team instead of aiming at the gunship with its deadly composite laser.

"Fools, fire at the ship, they can't escape without the ship!" ordered Dooku. The droid commander complied. The droid tank shifted its fire to the gunship, but the shells ignited on the bridge cables.

_Come on! This baby's turning into a sieve. _Shouted Stack into the radio.

Nobi was with the red eyed woman, dragging along from cover to cover as he lay down covering fire. To their credit, the droids were fearless. They just stood there and took the fire. By the time they reached the bridge, more than half their numbers were metal scrap.

"Keep running!" Nobi shouted to her. Nobi was falling further and further behind. The sadistic clones ran 20 miles a day with packs. Nobi could barely finish a 5 mile course.

Kayla reached the gunship first, she turned back and lay down sniping cover for the rest of the team. Howe and Stack were right after her.

A pain shot up Nobi's leg. He looked at it, the distinctive cauterized burn of a blaster. Not life threatening, but his left leg wouldn't move. The red eyed woman turned back, and starting to help him up.

"Go, get to the gunship" gasped Nobi, the blaster fire was picking up. The droid tank was trying to find a better position. "leave me, he won't kill me."

"Come on mister Nobi, get up," she draped one of his arms over her shoulders as support. They were almost at the gunship, armored plated arms reached out for him.

One of the droid tanks landed a lucky shot. The projectile ricochet on the cables and slammed into the side turret, exploding it, and buried itself into the electrical systems box. The composite laser reactor went first, causing a second fireball that fried the secondary controls systems.

In the cock pit, Stack noticed the explosion, it didn't sound too bad. The LAAT/I was built sturdy, with dual redundant systems for every critical component. Suddenly his engines firewalled by themselves. Stack yanked the throttle back to idle, but the engines remained at red line. By the time he looked outside the cockpit window, he was at 1,000 feet and climbing.

"_We left Nobi and that woman behind!" _ screamed Kayla over the intercom.

But Stack was still busy trying to regain throttle control. Okay, he can't control his throttle, but at least the rudder still works.

"I've lost engine controls, we're still flying, but we can't stop, short of shutting down the engines. A second LAAT/I is coming down now. I'm going to fly a protective orbit for Nobi. You folks can cover him from the left bay. Action left!" said Stack. It was good to let everybody in the gunship know what's going on, part of his crew resource management training.

Stack dropped back to 500 feet and started flying left hand orbit, to point the still functional ball turret at the enemy, and let the guys in the back lay down suppressing fire until the second gunship does the pick up.

The back Kayla set her sniper rifle on the floor of the gunship on its bipod, and starting picking off targets. At first everybody had trouble actually finding Nobi. But it was easy enough to follow the blaster fire. The red eyed woman had dragged Nobi behind a pile of cable rubble. They could see Nobi was down to his side arm. They could also very well see Dooku with his red lightsaber advancing with the droids towards Nobi.

"Shoot at Dooku!" screamed Kayla. The whole cabin opened up in single shots, everyone of them were terrified of hitting Nobi. Dooku, noticing the fire picking up around him, got smart, he turned off his lightsaber, making him invisible on the battlefield again.

"Anybody see him?" cried Kayla. The gunship was circling faster and faster. Stack was rapidly losing control of the LAAT/I. "Where is the other Latty?"

Then they saw, or more like they heard the other LAAT/I coming in. It began to spiral to the landing zone, rapidly losing altitude.

Out the window they saw blue streaks of electricity shot out near the bridge. They saw the woman jumped in front of the Sith lighting to protect Nobi, she didn't move after that. Nobi was down to his last rounds, firing at Dooku, defiant to the last. Kayla could not completely hide the pride she felt for Nobi, making his last stand like that. A boy had become a man, a pity it took death and war to achieve that.

The second gunship was ten feet from landing, when a missile streaked towards it and blew the whole gunship up. There were no survivors.

Everyone on board was aghast. Now Nobi would be stranded, worst captured by Dooku. Captured Jedi do not face imprisonment, they face executions.

Howe made a decision. "We're gonna keep circling and cover him until we run out of fuel. If he can get across the bridge, he has a chance. We're gonna give him that chance," Howe said for everyone.

Out the window they could see that Nobi was out of ammo. Dooku was holding his light saber high over Nobi, ready for the execution. Howe never felt so helpless in his life. Here he had guns, rifles, composite laser beams, all of those were light weapons, useless against a skilled Jedi. The one weapon that could take Dooku down, was the radiation burst missiles every gunship carried. But that would vaporize Nobi along with Dooku.

Kayla saw a sandstorm, no not a sandstorm, a whirlwind of sand beginning to form around Nobi. _Is this how Jedi go out? How poetic. _The whirlwind was getting stronger and stronger. She shifted her rifle scope to the right and saw that, the thought-dead green haired woman, was floating in the middle of the whirlwind. She was floating! Not Jumping! The clones were awed. As she moved, the mini sand-storm engulfed Nobi. They could see Dooku swinging lightsaber around in an attempt to blindly find Nobi. When that didn't work, he tried the Sith lightining. It didn't penetrate the sandstorm.

"SAMs 3 o'clock low!" screamed one of the clones. The droid army has finally extended their anti air bubble.

Kayla felt the ship tilt in all sorts of crazy direction. Her stomach lurched up to her throat while Stack evaded the missile. There was a small explosion aft. Then the intercom blared, "I've lost engine number 2, we're barely flying as it is."

Kayla saw Howe and Stack marking positions on the tactical map. They were already planning to go back out and recover Nobi, dead or alive. But it would not be today, or tomorrow, or ever, for that matter.


End file.
